On Trains & Buses

Things become clearer

Posted on September 10, 2011

Reading time: 1 minutes.

While I was away down south over the last week, we got fuller clarity regarding what is going to happen to those subsidised bus services whose funding is about to be withdrawn. Some such as the Sunday 10A between Bollington and Macclesfield will become commercial operations while others like the Sunday 108 between Stockport, Macclesfield and Leek or the summer Sunday 27 between Macclesfield and Knutsford will cease to exist. Seemingly, some operators are willing to give things a go while others aren’t.

Quite a few school services are getting the chop too though some operators (Hulme Hall come to mind here) are speaking to schools. This is something that is undesirable given the need to cut down on car use for the school run but you have to ask what kind of message service cuts like these are sending to people.

Still, the reductions aren’t going to be as bad as elsewhere but we cannot be complacent either, After all, the weekday evening (Monday to Saturday, that is) 130 Macclesfield to Parr’s Wood service just about came above the threshold for withdrawal of support. The counterargument to criticism of the loss of bus services applies here too: use it of lose it. That may sound harsh but it seems to be the world in which we are living at the moment.